Phreaky Friday: Amazon Charging for Digital Publication?

Via Scoop.it – DevolutionRob at Rob on Writing has an interesting take on what’s to come: Amazon charging authors to use their marketplace. This makes me all squirmy inside because he makes some good, scary points. Click the link below and see what you think. ~ ChazzVia robonwriting.com

3 Responses

There are so many things wrong with his argument that I hardly know where to start. Even assuming that Amazon would want to weed out the incompetent wannabe writers, charging any significant amount of money would also cut down on the number of excellent writers publishing on that platform. His assumption seems to be that only the bad writers would be deterred. Is he completely unaware that a lot of new writers simply couldn’t afford to pay for the privilege? Not to mention that they are already paying Amazon with every sale? Charging to publish would send all those people to competitors, and open the doors to new competitors. Amazon rarely makes massively stupid moves, and I can’t see them making this one.

I think the argument is idiotic. Writing a great book isn’t about how much money you can throw at it; it’s about talent. The only thing charging a fee does is limit the number of books based on the one who has the money to afford the additional cost.

I just finished reading an article about Amanda Hocking and the reason she made a leap into self-publishing. Basically, she wanted to raise $300 to go to an event featuring Jim Henson. She hoped to sell enough copies to family and friends pay for the trip. If she didn’t even have $300 to pay for a trip, chances are she didn’t have $500 to publish the book. To argue she deserved to remain unpublished because she couldn’t afford $500 is just plain ridiculous.

Great topic to get people riled and drive traffic, but really a dumb-dumb mentality. :) It goes along with the idea folks don’t deserve to be published because they couldn’t land an agent.

His argument also underestimates the readers. Despite the plentiful number of books being published on a daily basis, readers are still able to discover enjoyable works to read. They don’t need Amazon to cull the herd through fees any more than they need traditional agents/publishers to act as gatekeepers to readers.